Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin assigns blame to himself and his church for passage of same-sex marriage law in R.I.

Tuesday

Aug 13, 2013 at 10:34 PM

PROVIDENCE — Addressing a wide range of issues posed to him Tuesday night at a meeting of the state’s Young Republicans, Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas J. Tobin said he was not only deeply disappointed by...

By RICHARD C. DUJARDIN

PROVIDENCE — Addressing a wide range of issues posed to him Tuesday night at a meeting of the state’s Young Republicans, Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas J. Tobin said he was not only deeply disappointed by the passage of same-sex marriage in Rhode Island, but that he felt a sense of personal failure on his part as well as a failure of the Catholic Church in Rhode Island to keep it from becoming law.

“I was profoundly disappointed that the state moved in that direction and that so many Catholic politicians abandoned ship on this issue,” the bishop said, speaking to about 40 people at the Holy Rosary Band Hall on Gano Street in Fox Point. “This was a critical issue, and they let us down.”

Though a good deal of the questions at the two-hour session dealt with the church’s teaching on respect for life, questions toward the end shifted to what one participant referred to as the “pink elephant” in the room and whether there might be a way for members to uphold traditional marriage while not denying “some of our friends” who are gay — by having a system that recognizes civil marriage for gays while at the same time reserving sacramental marriage that allows only marriages between one man and one woman.

“Well, that’s what we have now. We feel we do not have the right to redefine marriage from what God has designed. We believe that any homosexual activity is immoral, and for the state to establish same-sex marriage would be a state approbation of that.”

Bishop Tobin added that the church continues to have a great deal of respect for all people, and “loves and supports” those with same-sex attraction, and that “they should not be subject to any sort hate or discrimination.”

He said he believes that same-sex marriage passed in Rhode Island as a result of a tidal wave of support for gay marriage that came as a result of President Obama’s “evolving support” for it and heavy lobbying by the entertainment and news media, the support given to it by Rhode Island House Speaker Gordon Fox, the Rhode Island State Council of Churches, the Board of Rabbis and by others.

For gays working for passage of the law, “this was their issue” and they obviously were strongly invested in it, he said, while for the church, the issue was important but just one of many issues.

In an interview afterward, Bishop Tobin, who has not commented publicly on the gay-marriage issue since its passage in May, said he did not believe that he and other gay-marriage opponents were undercut by Pope Francis’ remarks during a news conference on a return flight from Brazil that “if a person with a same attraction is of good will and seeks to follow the Lord, who am I to judge?”

Bishop Tobin said the pope had simply restated the church’s teaching with different words, and never said that homosexual activity is not a sin.

On the question of whether priests should deny Communion to couples they know are living together — be they as gay couples or cohabitating heterosexual couples — Bishop Tobin said that question would be best left to the individual parish priests who know the individuals and who have counseled the couples about the church’s teaching.

During his address Tuesday, Bishop Tobin said he felt he was out of his element speaking to a political group, but noted at the onset that he had had changed his political affiliation from Democrat to Republican, largely based on his dismay at the Democratic Party’s support for abortion rights.

At the same time, he urged those considering political careers to hold on to their moral convictions and not to base their votes solely on the latest polls.

The bishop had been invited to the gathering by Daniel Harrop, a Republican who recently threw his hat in the ring for another try at becoming the mayor of Providence. Harrop said he invited the bishop after hearing him speak at a seminar on religious freedom held at Portsmouth Abbey.

On other topics, the bishop said that during a recent visit to a beach in Florida, he saw notice closing a portion of the beach to the public to protect the endangered sea turtle. He said the church believes too in the need for protecting God’s creation but it seemed strange that the federal government is so willing “to protect the unborn sea turtle but not protect unborn children.”

He strongly defended the right of the church and all religious believers to speak out on matters of political discourse, saying the separation of church and state is meant to protect the church from interference from the state, not the other way around.

He said it was deplorable that the new healthcare exchanges that have been set up as part of the implementation of the Affordable Health Care Law in Rhode Island do not include even one option allowing participants to choose a plan that does not provide coverage for abortion. “That to me is a dictatorship, and you have to wonder who’s imposing what on whom.”

Asked why the church doesn’t clamp down on Catholic politicians who help to enact laws that extend or expand abortion rights, the bishop said it’s hard to say to someone “you’re not a Catholic anymore” except under certain conditions, and that frustrating as it may be to some in the pro-life movement, “I don’t have the canonical right to do that.”